TERRY LABONTE NOTES & QUOTES

LABONTE DRIVING FINAL '600': Terry Labonte will drive a No. 44 CARQUEST Chevrolet on Sunday in his final 600-mile race at Lowe's Motor Speedway. The event -- his 55th start at the 1.5-mile track -- marks the third of 10 events Labonte is running for Hendrick Motorsports in his final NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series season.

LABONTE AT LOWE'S: Labonte has logged more than 17,000 laps at Lowe's Motor Speedway, where he won the 1996 UAW-GM Quality 500 en route to his second NEXTEL Cup championship. The Corpus Christi, Texas, native also posted victories in the 1988 and 1999 NASCAR NEXTEL All-Star Challenge at the Concord, N.C., track. He will make his final start there on Oct. 14.

LABONTE'S FIRST LOWE'S RUN: Labonte made his first Lowe's Motor Speedway start on Oct. 8, 1978. He qualified 16th, finished 24th and took home $2,475 after engine problems sidelined the effort.

2,952 LAPS LED: Hendrick Motorsports entries have led 2,952 total laps in 44 points-paying NEXTEL Cup events at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

FACTOID OF THE WEEK: According to calculations by Hendrick Motorsports engineers, NEXTEL Cup teams will need to pit every 18 minutes under green-flag conditions during the 600-mile event on Sunday. NASCAR has mandated a 13-gallon fuel cell for the race.

HENDRICK HAS 13 AT LOWE'S: Team owner Rick Hendrick has notched 13 points-paying NEXTEL Cup victories at Lowe's Motor Speedway, putting him first on the track's all-time win list. Junior Johnson and Petty Engineering are tied for second with eight apiece.

SIX BEST TRACKS: Hendrick Motorsports has double-digit NEXTEL Cup victories at six different tracks: Lowe's Motor Speedway (13), Martinsville Speedway (13), Darlington Raceway (11), Daytona International Speedway (10), Dover International Speedway (10) and Pocono Raceway (10).

VICKERS & LABONTE AT SPEED STREET: On Friday, May 26, Brian Vickers and Terry Labonte will greet fans and sign autographs at the Speed Street festival in downtown Charlotte, N.C. Vickers will appear at the Team Chevy display beginning at 4 p.m. local time and Labonte will be available at 4:30 p.m. at the Kid's Zone.

TERRY LABONTE, DRIVER OF THE NO. 44 CARQUEST CHEVROLETS: (HOW HAVE THINGS CHANGED SINCE YOU RAN YOUR FIRST RACE AT LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY IN OCTOBER 1978?) "If you figured it out, as far as how much you took home versus how much it cost the owner to field a car, you probably made more money back then [LAUGHS]. I can guarantee that the purses haven't kept up with the expenses. But NASCAR has definitely changed a lot. We didn't win a whole lot of money back then, but we didn't spend very much either."

LABONTE: (ON RUNNING HIS FINAL 600-MILE RACE AT LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY.) "I guess the '600' is the only deal I haven't won there. I've won a couple Busch Series races, the All-Star race a couple times and the October race. I think second is the best I've ever done in the '600.' My biggest concern going into this one is the smaller fuel tanks and pitting every 17 minutes or so. We're going to have an awful lot of pit stops and they've got such a hard tire. From watching the All-Star race, it seems like it's going to be pretty difficult to pass. I don't really know what to expect. I guess we'll see how the track changes, but I think it'll be pretty hard to run side-by-side."

LABONTE: (YOU RAN YOUR FIRST NASCAR EVENTS IN 1978 AND YOUR FIRST 600-MILE RACE AT LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY IN 1979. WHAT WAS IT LIKE GOING FROM 200-LAP RACES ON SHORT TRACKS TO 500- AND 600-MILE CUP RACES?) "The '600' was a pretty long event, but to me it didn't seem as long as a 500-miler at Dover (Del.). When you compared the two, I thought 600 miles at Lowe's was easier than 500 at Dover because you're making 500 laps versus 400."

LABONTE: (ON THE SUCCESS OF HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS AT LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY.) "From the first time I ran a Hendrick car there, I just felt like we had a good combination. The car handled well and had a good engine. Just the whole package was good. Sometimes you go to race tracks and you just don't have the total package, but Hendrick has always had a pretty good combination at Lowe's. The record speaks for itself."

LABONTE: (ON TEAMMATE JIMMIE JOHNSON.) "Man, he's just awesome at Lowe's. He's someone you can judge yourself off of during practice. You can look at your times and you don't need to compare them to anyone else's but his. You always know he's going to be one of the top guys there, for sure."

LABONTE: (DO TEAMS SEEM TO TAKE MORE PRIDE IN RUNNING WELL AT LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY?) "So many of the teams are based around Charlotte and running well there gives them a lot of bragging rights. If they win, it's quite an accomplishment. A lot of the teams look at Lowe's as their home track and the '600' is a huge event. Everyone puts a lot of effort into all the races there."